Nokia announced it has filed claims in the UK High Court, Dusseldorf and Mannheim District Courts in Germany and the District Court of the Hague, Netherlands, alleging that Apple infringes Nokia patents in many of its products sold in these countries, including iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

“These actions add 13 further Nokia patents to the 24 already asserted against Apple in the US International Trade Commission and the Delaware and Wisconsin Federal courts,” said Paul Melin, vice president, Intellectual Property at Nokia. “The Nokia inventions protected by these patents include several which enable compelling user experiences. For example, using a wiping gesture on a touch screen to navigate content, or enabling access to constantly changing services with an on-device app store, both filed more than ten years before the launch of the iPhone.”

None of the asserted patents have been declared essential to any wireless communication standard.

During the last two decades, Nokia has invested approximately EUR 40 billion in research and development and built one of the wireless industry’s strongest and broadest IPR portfolios, with around 11,000 patent families. Nokia is a world leader in the development of handheld device and mobile communications technologies, which is also demonstrated by Nokia’s strong patent position.

Source: Nokia

MacDailyNews Take: There are two reasons why patent infringement lawsuits are filed: Somebody actually is infringing on your intellectual property or you can’t compete, so you litigate.

Over the next 5 years, the fallout from poor patent review processes is going to be huge. These companies (including Apple, Nokia, Motorola, IBM, Microsoft, etc. etc.) were permitted to file patents on just about anything under the sun, and many of them overlap considerably.

It will take years and cost millions of dollars to figure out who actually owns which patents, and which patents are just plain invalid or useless.

Meanwhile I’ll just keep using my iPhone and wait for the iPad 2 to come out.

Why all the different filings? Is this a tactic to deter the accused from mounting a defense on grounds of cost and complexity, or is it hoped that one court may be more useful or rigorous than another?